


Living Life

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: AU, peice of shit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-07-31
Updated: 2011-07-31
Packaged: 2017-10-22 01:24:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/232169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They all get to see what it was like to be each other, it isn't quite what they imagined at all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Living Life

**Author's Note:**

> I figured this was long enough to warrant it's own fic. If you were reading it in my old group of drabble pieces, it won't update there anymore!  
> (In other news there is now almost a plot)

They wake up together in some dank basement. Sixteen heroes all open their eyes and see again for the first time, and they can't remember quite how they got there. There is joy and rejoicing and crying and cussing, and two of them, purple, slip out unnoticed in to the night.

Days pass by, and one by one they remember a demon and how they killed it. They see how this world they got for winning won't last long, because the game thought it fit to combine everything as best it could, which was not well at all.

It is understood that a democracy with an Empress will not last terribly long.

The world is in a tumult, trolls kill humans and humans kill trolls and they all survive through it. Trolls come out on top but humans adapt, and they all make it out alright.

(One troll absently wonders where one of the trolls with purple blood went all those days ago, a human says they saw someone who looked quite a lot like one of them, but he was gone as soon as he was seen)

They keep the powers they gained back in the Incipisphere, and with a little bit of working at it they get better and better (not the gods, of course, they know all that there is to).

When the Seer of Mind starts giggling one day and says that she wants to try something, no one rejects beyond a few angry mumbles.

The Seer's experiment goes terribly wrong. When they all drop off to sleep that night they wake up in something akin to a dream bubble, with some sort of mix between a human and a horror terror waiting for them (and to their surprise, the two purple-bloods are there with them too, although they can't even speak with each other so the point is moot).

The human/eldrich terror doffs his hat to them and says that they'll all be seeing each others lives, and not to blame the Seer, the was simply the means to his ends.

They wake up terribly confused. When asked the seer says she has no idea what happened, it wasn't what she planned at all (and when asked what her real plan was she giggles again and says it's not anyone's business but her own).

The next time they're all asleep they find that the well dressed, tentacled terror kept true to its promise. They are ushered into a room similar to a movie theater and the screen in front of them flashes to life. They are informed that the order they are watching is completely arbitrary.  
The theater (if it could be called that) darkens and a Scorpio symbol flashes up on the screen.

They then proceed to watch what basically amounts to Vriska Serket's entire life.  
By the end of it, everyone thinks that maybe they were lucky they weren't born Vriska, they all certainly find it harder to hate her anyways (and that's not what she wanted all all, what a 8ad 8reak).

Two days later they learn the sad tale of a mutant Karkat Vantas, and they find it a whole lot easier to pity him after that.

Three days after they see the tale of a high blood high on sopor. It's terrifying to say the least, and when they all wake, they immediately go out to find him.  
They make short work of the search with the help of two seers. He is found curled up behind a dumpster, drained of all rage.  
(They bring him back and he gets better, but no matter what they do he refuses to eat sopor, he does nothing but lie in it all day instead).

Many, many days later, it comes as a shock when it happens, they dream of the life of the other purple blood, the other troll that ran away.

It is not what they expected at all.

They learn that they've never actually talked to Eridan Ampora, only his body pulled on the strings of so many puppet masters(everyone, really. It's turns out he's been under the influence of Horrorterrors, angels, exiles, anyone, anyone but himself).

A carapace woman killed Feferi and Kanaya, not the Hipster Fish (there was never any hipster fish, really that far along he'd simply taken to just curling up in his own mind and watching).  
The troll Vriska had hated and Feferi had kept from killing was some tentacled beast who wondered how long it could keep it up before breaking the boy or another Terror noticed (the beast was sneaky, it was never noticed and instead got bored and left, sweeps later)

 

When they wake up the first thing they try to do is find him. They look for days, a few catch a glimpse of him, but he's always seen them first, and he disappears down some ally before they can even yell his name.  
(The Seers say he's probably hoping he won't be found, and as the Prince of Hope that could do quite a lot for him)

Hope can only do so much for him, though.

On a cloudy night Karkat finds himself stranded in the downtown streets of the city (it was stupid to go, he knew, but he was stir crazy, he couldn't help himself). He walks in the direction he remembers as home, avoiding the drones that patrol the streets. (The air feels heavy with the weight of an oncoming storm, Karkat hopes it doesn't rain before he gets home, but where has hope ever gotten him?)

Then he sees who they've been looking for, and for once Karkat hasn't been noticed first.

He makes the mistake of wondering what course of action he should take, and in that brief moment he is seen.

This narrows his options down to chasing after the fleeing sea troll.

(Something is wrong with the purple-blood, he's out of breath far to quickly as thin as he looks)

Karkat is faster than he's ever been in his life. He ends up on top of Eridan, pinning down his arms.

They both do nothing but pant for a while, not a word has passes between them.

The first drops of rain splash down on the sea troll's glasses as he closes his eyes and says, “If your gonna kill me than make it quick, please”

The mutant blood chokes out, “No, no one's going to kill you”  
He stands up and reaches a hand out. Eridan looks confused and scared, but he takes it.

Something goes wrong, the moment Eridan is on his feet his legs give out and he's kneeling on the ground clutching his head.

Karkat discovers Eridan (yes Eridan, Eridan Ampora and not some Horrorterror) is sick, and has been for a while.

The sea-troll promptly passes out.

One troll caries the other back home (Eridan is very light, Karkat doubts he's been eating). By some stroke of luck they make it back with no problem.

They're exited when he's brought in, because when he wakes up, they get to meet Eridan Ampora for the first time.  
\---

Everybody waits for Eridan to wake up, they want meet this kid, they want to see if his accent is real, want to see just what a boy who's never been in control of his own life could be like. The problem arises when he's still sleeping hours later, Karkat can't help but wonder just how sick this kid is.

They wait. Feferi idly wonders aloud if her life powers would help at all, Karkat silently asks the same about his blood.

Only in the middle of the night (the sun was dim enough now that the trolls had, with some prodding from the humans, become diurnal) when all but one is sleeping, does the sea-troll awaken. He does nothing but lie still for a minute or two, taking guesses about where is is and how he got there (and he is right when he thinks he's where everyone else is, and Karkat must have brought him here, he just doesn't know it yet).

Eridan sits up slowly (no need to pass out again, if he can help it) and looks around warily, hands occupied with twisting his scarf around in a sort of nervous habit.  
(He still has the scarf, but the cape is long gone. His rings are missing too, they've probably been pawned off somewhere. Interestingly he still has his glasses, despite a large crack that runs through one of the lenses)

He examines each sleeping troll around him, remembering their names and how much each one of them should probably hate him. When he spots his (well not his) ex-morail, Eridan nearly has a panic attack.

But he manages to calm himself down quickly enough. If they were going to hurt him they would have tied him up or something, right? (not quite)

Eridan, in his nervous-sickness, fails to notice that he has an observer. The observer, obviously, observes, but Eridan isn't doing much, so doing nothing but watching quickly bores her.  
The observer decides to move on to bigger things, like say, talking. She figures she ought to take it slow, keep from scaring the fish-boy (after all they've never really talked before).

The observer slides, on her knees, into the light.  
Eridan notices almost immediately, and freezes still, mind racing.

He remembers this girl, but he can't quite put his finger on her name. She's obviously one of the humans, but he's pretty sure that this girl isn't Rose, and she's probably not, who was it, John? She's probably not John either.

He settles for a shaky sounding, “Hey”

She grins and replies in a chipper voice, “Hi, Eridan!”

Now Eridan, regardless of who or what was in control of his body, has never been good at social interactions. Instead of asking questions or trying to keep a conversation going, he simply gapes like a fish out of water, ringing his scarf (although to be fair, he's having a terrible time thinking anything at all because of the terrible headache he's got)

For a terribly long minute the two stare at each other, the only sound breaking the silence is the muffled drizzle of rain and the occasional snore of a sleeper.

The girl fidgets and chews on her lip, Eridan is in danger of fraying the end of his scarf beyond repair. There is a few more moments of rain-choked silence, the the girl (Jade, he's pretty sure Jade is he name) half-whispers, “So um... are you feeling okay?”

Once again, Eridan has no idea of what he should say.

Eventually he stutters out, “I'm fine”, but judging from the expression on Jade's face, she doesn't buy that at all (rightly, of course, the first thing she heard about when Eridan arrived was an announcement by a certain fuckass of a troll saying just how sick the fish-boy was).

However, her expression changes to a smile once again as a thought occurs to her. She says, “I'll bet you're hungry!”

Jade stands up, and without waiting for any sort of confirmation skips off to what is presumably a kitchen of sorts, leaving Eridan more or less alone again.

He uses the time to take his mind off of the more pressing matters that probably should be weighing on his mind to instead examine his surroundings a bit better.

The rooms he's in has plain gray stone walls and lights set into the ceiling so that you can't actually see the source. The floor, presumably stone as well, is covered with so many blankets and sleeping bodies that it's kind of hard to tell.  
(Most of the trolls don't bother to find sopor anymore, dream bubbles are still very much a real thing, so it doesn't matter where they sleep, they're going to dream of tentacles either way.)

Then just like that, Eridan's more or less alone time is over as Jade reenters the room, holding a glass of water and a handful of crackers (because Eridan is sick and Jade is learning how to be thoughtful).  
She hands him the crackers first, and though it's true that Eridan is hungry (starving, really) he doesn't eat them like he is. He's picked up a few tricks, living out on the street like he did.  
One of them was figuring out that eating really slow makes you feel full. It's hard to feel full living on nothing but scraps.

As slow as he tries to eat them, the crackers are gone just a bit too quickly, and when Jade hands him the water he has a brief moment where he realizes just how thirsty he really is.  
The water is gone as fast as he can drink it, Eridan licks his lips dry and is about to ask for more when Jade says (mostly to herself), “I don't think I should give you anymore, you might throw up or something!”

Eridan is about to protest, but he realizes she's probably right, so he just mumbles ,”Thanks” instead. Jade grins and sits down next to him, ready to talk about whatever it is human girl like to talk about.

And she does. Luckily for Eridan, all he has to do is nod and smile, because the girl just seems to want to make noise .  
Eridan is trying to listen, he really is, but it's so easy to just drift off to sleep again.  
And that he does.

When Eridan wakes up, this time everyone else is up with him.

The moment they notice he's conscious everyone (sans one) gathers around him, interested, concerned, but most of all curious.   
All the crowding makes the fishy troll nervous it takes a minute or two to work up the nerve to speak, and even longer before he can even work a word in between all the questions and yelling.

Everyone is interested to learn a few things, most noticeably that his accent isn't near as exaggerated as they last heard it. He admits he likes magic (they know, he was overjoyed when he got to see it was real), he's still a bit of a history buff, although he's forgotten more than he'd otherwise care to admit, and he's got a bit of a phobia of anything with tentacles (but who could blame him?)  
It becomes obvious through it all that the game had named _this_ Eridan, the Eridan who, while he couldn't fight against his mind-takers had always prayed they'd let him go, the Prince of Hope.

Something only a few of them pick up on is that he doesn't like crowds, at least not crowds of people he feels should be offended at him.  
He drives the crowd off in the only way he can, answering their questions. And they certainly seem to have a lot, one of the humans (THIS one is Rose) keeps going on about horrorterrors.

But eventually the questions dry up, Eridan is left to his own.  
On his own, he manages to fall asleep. Again.  
He drifts in and out of consciousness, at best waking up with a pounding headache.   
Slowly, and not without a lot of help, he recovers.

Somewhere along the way, they were brought back into what they had begun referring to as the dream-theater, where they watched the life, death, life, death, and life of Aradia Megido.  
(Eridan is simply glad it gets the focus off of him).

Now he can do (mostly) what he pleases, without anyone following him around, and that is exactly what he does.  
He goes to visit the other purple blood, the other one that fled, and finds him curled up inside what can only be described as a water bed filled with sopor.

Gamzee is just curled up in there, staring out with blood-shot eyes that aren't focused on much of anything.

Eridan looks at him and says, concerned, “Gamz?”  
It takes a moment or two but Gamzee is able to focus on Eridan. He says something that doesn't sound like a word at all.  
Ampora says, “What?”  
Makara screams out “FUCK”, but in the next instant he's shivering and covering his mouth

Within the hour Gamzee is crying and hugging Eridan, who is trying his hardest to be a good morail. (Okay, that's not what it is at all, but he doesn't know what else to call it).

Everything is going swimmingly as it can, until Gazmee gets to the part about how he's lonely. This somehow turns into the Bard trying to make out with the Prince.

Eridan absconds the fuck out of there; Gamzee learns that at least one purple blood among them is terrified of the bucket quadrants, and it certainly isn't him.  
(It is to be noted that this wasn't always the case, but the sick mockery a certain tentacle beast made out of them really kind of ruined the idea of romance for Eridan, at least for a while).

He decides to go for a walk, because he certainly doesn't want to deal with anyone asking him whats wrong right now.

He goes down to what's considered the worst part of the best part of town, the He stands on the banks of the river and watches the occasional ship sail by.  
This is his spot, its where he comes to think and has been since he got dropped off on this weird half alien planet.

He's never had to share it with anyone until today.  
No today of all days, when he wants to be alone most a miss Megido wants to talk.

She approaches him from behind, startling him out of his thoughts with “Hey! Eridan!”  
He jumps, she laughs. “I wasn't expecting to see you down here,” she says, “what's up?”  
He shifts around nervously and says, “Nothin' much, just... thinkin'...wwhat about you wwhat are you doin' here?”

It takes real skill, to carry on a conversation when he wants one to end, and to end every conversation he wants to keep up.

She says she was getting tired of everyone hanging around her giving her these sad looking stares.  
Aradia laughs and says Eridan doesn't have much room to pity her, does he?

Eridan finds he appreciates the company, once they get on the topic of ancient history. They walk home and manage to talk until the wee hours of the morning, agreeing over the fact that that old history really isn't something that should be lost and telling all the stories they can remember.

 

(Eridan would later remember it as one of the few times he got to be a kid, he wasn't sure if he ever found a way to thank Aradia for that)


End file.
